Friday, 18 May 2012

I totally forgot for half the morning then at lunchtime it came right to my head to tell my friends they are allowed as much salad, bread and fruit as they like. I told them to spread it around the school quickly because no one had gone around the classes and told them. I was a bit nervous to ask but I did ask for more peas!

I chose a Chicken grill which on the old menu was called a chicken burger but it is exactly the same. With it I had chips which means it must be Friday and you can see my extra peas! One of my peas was black, I had a black eyed pea! If you look closely its the one in the middle. I love the sticky gooey icing the school puts on its sponges.

Last year my friends and I started a club, which the school let us run, called Charity Children. We raised money for Mary's Meals. In our first sale we raised £70 in three hours which is enough to feed 7 children school lunches for a WHOLE YEAR! A lot of kids go to school everyday just for the food. Each lunch costs 6p to make.

This is Liberia. It's rice, fish and vegetables. I hope they are eating the meals we paid for.

Hello!My daughter never eats the school lunch because she says it is always gross, it seems the "free lunch" for those less fortunate is worse than one that isn't included that you have to pay for even if you are on the "free lunch" seems kindof wrong. :(

I am not sure where your daughter goes to school and what age she is. In the primary school where I work as a teacher all the children having a school lunch are offered the same food and there is certainly no distinction between those children who pay for their meal and those who are entitled to it for free. I wonder though if this is different in a cafeteria style system often used in secondary schools. Our school lunches are a whole lot more appetising than those shown on this blog and many of the teachers choose to buy a school meal a few times a week as they are really quite tasty!

These seem really unappetizing meals and really not sufficient. I commend you for doing these posts and publicizing what sort of meals you and your classmates are being given and hope that you continue to do this. In North America, depending on where you live, most kids will bring their own lunches to school, which usually consists of some sort of sandwich, a drink, and a snack. Continue with the awesome work.

It appears that those Nigerian children you're helping are getting a better lunch than yours!

I see one 'chicken burger' that appears to be a lot like the 99p ones at McDonald's, six chips (if there are any more lurking unseen, please correct me), a decent amount of peas, and a bit of cake.

This is not the worst meal I've seen here nutritionally, but it's still mingy. It would have inspired my nine-year-old self to emulate Oliver Twist confronting the master - 'Please, Sir - I want some more!'

Hi, Melissa, I am Flora from Taiwan. Talk about school meal plan here. From Kindergarten to High school, Taiwan here will have two or three committee to work on it. One is the major lead, school, which is the pay and order window. Two is the parent committee, usually have rights to randomly check or report the meal plan's flaw.

The third one is the student committee, not in kindergarten, but start from Elementary school. Design the receipt or order component is one of their mission. I guess the system is from Japan since 60s.

They hope students care what they eat and know what they eat. They also hope student doing the prepare and clean job before and after. It is parts of the education all the time. Also mixed various event, like mama cook day. or papa cook day. In typhoon season, vegetable and fruit will be very expensive due to rain too much. So they may have Pasta day (lol)

While I was in high school's meal plan, we do have to give this monthly order to chief. Our way is not person by person, but table by table. Each table, 8 girls. One table master to arrange meal tasks, so far so on. Briefly saying that, more family table way, not the buffet/cafeteria way.

In your pictures, it is good that green food start to show on. Not the brown good. A simple rule that we let kid know is about 'five color each day' which is Rice/Noodle/Tofu : White. Veg: Green-Red-Yello-Black. Meat:Brown...

I also notice you use Plastic Plate. Taiwan here use Metal one due to more heating concern. We love Hot food!

The food that the little ones are eating in the other pic might look unappetising to the rest of us, but believe me, this is probably the only meal of the day for most of them! Tragic and terrible, but true. I worked in a school on a volunteer basis and the school head had set up a feeding scheme after he noticed that the majority of the kids didn't bring food to school. The poverty in their homes was so immense that the parent/s just couldn't afford it. Now, even though it's only one meal a day, at least they get something warm and nutritious. The level of grades has picked up and the kids are generally better behaved. Again, well done to you Martha (and your dad) for having the courage to speak out about this.(and don't take the black pea personally... :) )

That's brilliant! It's a bit silly though if they have a rule where you're allowed to have as much bread, vegetables and fruit as you like but they don't tell anyone! Good on you for spreading it around.

Fantastic work on the charity fundraising too. Just by linking it here I'm sure you'll get more funds raised for them.

I have a question, Veg (or perhaps Veg's Dad): Is the school lunch programme in your school for-profit or non-profit?

In America, school lunch programmes have traditionally been non-profit, with all money going towards the cost of food, kitchen and catering staff. But with today's 'privatisation,' some schools have turned their lunchrooms over to specialist catering firms who must make a profit. In every case I'm familiar with, the quality of lunch declines when the profit motive is introduced.

I am asking because of the very small amount of food Veg's school offers for £2. If a specialist firm is trying to make a profit, it would seem they are trying to profit too much. If the lunch programme is non-profit, it would seem that there is wastefulness or some other factor reducing the amount of money spent of the food served.

It would be very interesting to know where Veg's £2 goes each day, because not much of it seems to appear on the plate!

great job on this blog! it is waaay more interesting (and truthful) than most things i tend to see online. i also love that you are proving something that some kids+adults dont always believe: kids opinions matter! super amazing!! thank you for being a breath of fresh air. ps my mom works for a catering company that does a lot of school lunch programs here in the chicago area. and they offer really healthy options that i certainly never had when i was in school. i dont know how the price compares to regular school lunches, but you can get a lot of food for about $3.50. sometimes i go "visit" her just to get some of the great food. lol.

Well done for your amazing work! It's so inspirational for other young people to see people like you taking charge of their world, and refusing to be 'put in place' just because you are young. Congratulations :)

Love your bog. (American kids can't even put together a decent sentence at age 9, nevermind write a blog!) It's amazing what can be accomplished by shining a little light on the subject. Keep up the good work!

Cool blog, Veg! I worked as an English teacher in Japan for three years and the lunches we got were amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing. I think Japan is generally pretty good, but my town was especially excellent. Pictures of US lunches look so awful in comparison. That Taiwan one you posted was more like what we got. Keep up the good work.

I never allowed my children to eat school food. Yes, every morning I made 3 lunches, healthy, very tasty, plenty, varied. Their friends would ask them to have me make lunch for them also which I could not afford money or time to make them for 8+ more children. I am appalled at what schools in America feed our children. It is disgusting to look at, horrible tasting and has no real nutritional value. So sad.

Totally Brilliant! Back when I was eating school lunches the rolls were so hard you could bang them on the table and they still wouldn't break. Bravo to you for being so clever. Wishing you many more hairless and hopefully tasty and healthful meals. Happy to be following your blog. You may be at the beginnings of a stellar career.

Congratulations to you and your friends through this initiative, it gives me great pain when I'm in a place that I see people throw your food or leave it loose, when children are in the world who have nothing. S.O.S. Children's Villages have a program which participated in that month with a small fee you support the feeding of a child for one year.

Hi, Melissa, I like the table way, too. It brought me a lot of great time around the table. We love table jokes! I still remember one time, the joke was too funny. One girl is drinking corn soup. She just launch, cough and choke! a corn fly out from her nose suddenly .... and we laugh to tears!

Honestly, meal from school wasn't delicious all the time. It might be too healthy and boring. But table by table way is sort of making food with lots of stories. I miss my dinner table friends now...

Have you ever talk about food with your friends while eating? Taiwanese love to talk about food because this topic is always trendy and popular. I have a 3Y boy now. He has a food picture book and he loves to help me to prepare dinner. (like wash potato or pick up green peas) Every time after his help, he has more appetite for eating.

Working with Mary's Meals is great!I love how you keep on doing this blog every single day! Have you ever thought about sponsoring a school through Mary's Meals by asking for donations on your blog? I'm sure a lot of people would be happy to help! Keep up the great work! Love from Germany

Working with Mary's Meals is great!I love how you keep on doing this blog every single day! Have you ever thought about sponsoring a school through Mary's Meals by asking for donations on your blog? I'm sure a lot of people would be happy to help! Keep up the great work! Love from Germany

Dear Martha, Love your idea! School lunches weren't ever this good at my schools, as I had to bring them from home. I reckon Mum wouldn't have stood for these comments! But that aside, its not really strange that staff would tend to try and ban any comments based on observations. None of us are perfect, and its good to know what to eat and what not...the problem is we dont like criticism. None of us. From canteen staff to public servants....Here lies the problem: many deserve criticism because of poor performance, but many do try and get it wrong...but dont wish to change...Youre lucky as your school decided your likes and dislikes are not their conceren and can only lead to better lunches etc....Be careful though. Its easy to become a MEAN critic...be balanced. Like your meals.You got a mention in Australia: Link http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-16/council-overturns-ban-on-schoolgirl27s-food-blog/4074432